2.3.1.
Arctic Council
The Arctic Council is the leading intergovernmental forum promoting cooperation, coordination and integration among the Arctic States, arctic indigenous communities and other arctic inhabitants on common arctic issues focusing particularly on sustainable development of artic area. Other members of the Council include countries such as Norway, Russia, Canada and the United States. Starting from 2017, Finland will hold the chairmanship of the Arctic Council for two years. 2.3.2.
Marine industry development initiative
The Ministry of Employment and Economy has started the Marine Industry Development initiative for the years 2014-2016. The aim of the initiative is to improve the competitiveness of the Finnish marine industry. Additionally, the initiative aims to increase cooperation between research facilities, universities and companies in the marine and offshore industry, support Finnish companies’ growth and to increase R&D and product and service innovations in the sector. The initiative includes 10 projects. Examples include Team Arctic, an initiative that brings Finnish companies operating in the Arctic region together, and Marine and Technology Industries’ Customer Centric Growth program that is focusing on enabling market opportunities in oil and gas and offshore in the arctic areas, especially in Norway and Russia. 2.3.3.
Tekes Arctic Seas program
Tekes Arctic Seas program for the years 2014-2017 aims at turning Finland into an internationally attractive centre of Arctic know-how. Arctic Seas program offers financing for research, development and innovation to internationalizing companies. Tekes is the Finnish Funding Agency for Innovation. Goals of the Arctic Seas program
Finland is an internationally recognized Arctic know-how hub Creating new Arctic business activities Networking Finnish actors into internationally significant investment projects
Budget
Total: € 100M Tekes funding € 45M + companies € 55M Tekes funding for research institutes c.€ 12M
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